Stacey Pullen is the Kosmik Messenger. An innovator from the second wave of Detroit techno, he grew up under the mentorship of Detroit's legendary three: Derrick May, Juan Atkins and Kevin Saunderson. Still continuing to produce his characteristic atmosphere laden electronic sound, Stacey Pullen compounds his reputation as a producer with that of being one of the world's most in demand DJs, playing weekly across the globe year in year out. With a font of passion for music and performance that never dries up, Stacey Pullen still plays every gig from the heart, seeking to surprise and engage, to provide an unforgettable experience, to offer his unique catalogue up without predictability, defying expectation. Above all, from his earliest attempts to the current day Stacey Pullen has stayed true to his one goal: to become and to always be an Innovator.
From the age of 9, when he started playing flute in his school band, Stacey has always been playing musical instruments. In high school he found himself traveling around to a lot of cities in the USA playing percussion in school bands, which gave him a taste of – and preparation for – the traveling involved in life as a musician. He had also seen and been prepared for a musician's life from watching his father who was in a Motown band called the Capitals in the 1970's, filling much of Stacey's childhood with observations of a life dedicated to music and travel.
Around 1985, while Stacey was still drumming and traveling with his high school band, the Detroit Techno movement was born, and provided a revolutionary sound to the youth of Detroit. Stacey Pullen and some friends from his band took their cue from musical leaders like Jeff Mills and Electrifying Mojo Radio and began to experiment with turntables and a mixer. He also started clubbing around the age of 15, the first club he frequented was called 'The Primadonna', the first DJ he remembered was a local legend called Alan Ester and the first music he was clubbing to was called 'Progressive Music' – not in the sense of the word that we currently understand, but because, in Stacey's words “the meaning of 'progressive' was a futuristic way of thinking about music.” After graduating he went to university in Tennessee, leaving techno behind apart from mix tapes and weekend jaunts back to Detroit to go to legendary club the Music Institute. After a couple of years, Stacey realised his future was in music not academics, and he abandoned his course and moved home to make music full time.
Through The Music Institute, Stacey quickly got to know the leading lights of Detroit's underground: Alton Miller, Chez Damier, Derrick May. Alton was living in the same building as the club, and showed Stacey a lot of the background activity, including watching Derrick May making his tapes for his weekly radio show. Stacey approached Derrick, told him that he made music and Derrick invited him to play some to him. From here, Stacey started hanging out at the Transmat studios and became friends with Jay Denham, who was recording on Transmat sub label Fragile as 'Fade to Black'. Stacey watched Jay work, absorbed a lot of knowledge, and from there Stacey started putting more sophisticated beats together, making his first real tracks. He played some to Derrick who told him “ it's cool but you need to work harder” – which Stacey resolved to do and went back to the studio.
A couple of years later, in 1992, Derrick suggested that a good way to develop his skills would be for Stacey to do some remix work with Kevin Saunderson. Stacey began to work with Kevin on remixes including one for Karen White -'The Way I Feel About You' and some which never made it to print, including one for the Prodigy. While Kevin was originally commissioned, he asked Stacey to do his own remix. The Prodigy liked it, but their label didn't. Stacey kept the backing track without the Prodigy samples, and turned it into his first track which was later released through a subsidiary of KMS in 1993. After some more time perfecting his craft Stacey again played some original sounds to Derrick, who agreed to release his first Silent Phase track 'Ritual Beating System' as the 'Bango EP' on Fragile, which was Derrick's experimental label. Stacey was also invited to submit this track, “Wave The Rave Goodbye”, to a compilation of new Detroit artists on KMS. At this point Stacey truly became part of the Transmat/Metroplex/KMS team – the three studios worked very closely together, and were housed on different floors of the same building in downtown Detroit.